


$3.67

by galaxylove



Category: TWICE (Band)
Genre: Convenience Store AU, F/F, Fluff, cameo dubu too, cameo nayeon, like a whole lot of slowburn fluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-10
Updated: 2018-10-10
Packaged: 2019-07-29 03:31:03
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 12,134
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16255772
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/galaxylove/pseuds/galaxylove
Summary: Another night, another shift.(Or the SaMo convenience store AU that was meant to be a small one-shot.)





	$3.67

**Author's Note:**

> hey i have no control over how much i write anymore so this short oneshot ended up being one of my longest works, so that's fun

   Another night, another shift at the small convenience store two streets away from her apartment.

 

  She didn’t mind it, not really. The work was easy - all she had to do was watch the till and serve the customers that had nothing better to do than buy alcohol in the early hours of the morning, maybe clean up the food displays if they were looking a little messy, but for the most part she didn’t really have to do a lot outside of that. Voices drifted in from the street outside, and she got her hopes up for a moment that maybe they came from potential customers who’d give her something to do for a few minutes and help this shift pass by a little faster, but instead the voices got fainter and fainter as they walked away, and she slumped against the counter in mild despair.

 

  It was easy work, but it was also very, very boring. 

 

  But it was convenient. The old man who owned the store had a soft spot for the tired college student - she hadn’t been expecting much when she’d been desperately looking for a part time job just so she could survive on something other than instant ramen, and had came into this store expecting the same old ‘sorry, we’re not hiring’ line she’d heard from twelve different places already. Instead, she got kind, wrinkled eyes and a warm, caring smile, and conversation over a hot cup of tea out back. 

 

  To tell the truth, she’s pretty certain Mr Kim didn’t really need another employee for his store. She was an expense he could do without; he had two other employees to cover the shifts he didn’t tend to himself and the store didn’t really bring in enough money to comfortably cover another set of wages every week. 

 

  And yet, here Momo was. Working the late shift three times a week because Mr Kim said he had bad knees and an old man like him shouldn’t be up so late anyway. A stubborn old fool, but it’s because of this stubborn old fool that Momo’s cupboards were looking a little fuller than they did just over a year ago. 

 

  She smiled to herself, listening to the hum of the archaic drinks fridge in the corner and the sound of distant traffic through the open window. It was boring, but this place was just as familiar to her as her tiny little apartment. She liked how small and cosy the whole building was, with as much commercial goodness crammed into every corner possible, and she liked how the paint on the walls was peeled and flaking and could have done with a fresh coat a good two years before she’d even started working here. She liked the character of it all, how every tiny detail that other people would have otherwise rush to replace or fix or cover had been left to remain. Mr Kim trusted her enough at this point that she could do whatever she wanted on shift and would probably get his full backing, but she’d never been one to take this trust for granted. She counted the till at the end of the night, locked every last penny in the safe in his office and shut down the shop with her very own set of keys she’d been given just a few months after she started working there. 

 

  Maybe she’d take a lollipop or two from the plastic tub meant for kids on the counter, but there’s a reason Mr Kim has another box in the storage cupboard at all times, and it’s because he knows her far too well. 

 

  She sighs again, the soda machine humming obstinately in response. Just another, long, drawn out night where nothing happens. She reaches for another lollipop, gets the apple flavour (not her favourite, but definitely not the worst) and unwraps it to pop it in her mouth, resting her chin in her hands looking like the picture perfect display of bored, young convenience store worker on a late shift. It’s not even like she could go on her phone - she’d forgotten to charge it the night before, and even though she’d been frugal with it’s usage today the little red bar at the top of her screen still glared at her defiantly. She didn’t even have any homework to do. 

 

  Another car engine gets closer. Passes by. Her head thunks resoundingly onto the solid counter-top. 

 

  It was just her. In this tired, old store for the next two hours until she could finally lock up and go home. Maybe she’d take a magazine from the newspaper stand, at least give herself  _ something _ to do.

 

  The bell above the door chimes loudly to announce the arrival of a customer, axing her newly devised plan for a few minutes longer. She looks up in vague interest, curiosity dying down as soon as she sees the hooded figure shuffle their way over to the drinks refrigerator. Probably just another drunk looking for another can to send them off to sleep. Momo pulls her phone out of her pocket. Three notifications, one from Nayeon reminding her to get some more milk (they didn’t live together, but the older girl raided her apartment enough that they may as well do) and two from Chaeyoung updating her instagram. Eleven percent battery left. She sighs again, pocketing the device reluctantly as the other person in the store shuffles around a bit more. 

 

  She doesn’t think they’re going to steal anything, but a year working here has taught her that she can never be too sure. Watches them move from the fridge to the small shelf where they keep the instant noodles, and from there straight to the chocolate rack, not quite able to get a glimpse of their face as they turned. Whoever they were, Momo admired that they didn’t spend anytime browsing. This person knew what they came in for and didn’t want to waste any time about it. Unlike herself, who usually wasted at least five minutes debating which candy bar she wanted.

 

  “Hi.” 

 

  The soft voice jolts her out of her daydreaming. Or night dreaming, she’s never really known how to refer to it at this time of night. She looks at the person in front of her, trying to keep her eyes from widening in shock.

 

  She was  _ cute.  _ Messy bangs that the girl hadn’t bothered to fix, a long, high nose with thick, clunky glasses sitting comfortably that magnified the big, brown eyes behind the lenses. Soft, puffy cheeks - like she’d only just woken up from a nap and the last dredges of sleep still had yet to drain away, and, more importantly, pretty pale lips that were curving up into an ever growing smile the longer she took to respond. 

 

  Momo coughed. 

 

  “Hi, just these items?”

 

  The girl hums, pushing them across the counter and into Momo’s fumbling hands, the cashier being pleasantly surprised at seeing the girl had bought a carton of orange juice instead of a can of beer. Momo has a feeling she’s being watched as she takes her goddamn time scanning three shitty items because her hands never know how to listen when she needs them to. At least nobody else was around to watch her fumbling like an idiot, just the pretty girl patiently waiting for her items across the counter. 

 

  “Do you need a bag?”

 

  A polite smile. 

 

  “Yes please.”

 

  Bagging goes more smoothly, and she holds out the handles for the other girl to take as she tells her the total. Takes the time to give her another look over as the girl takes out coins from her pocket and starts counting. Pretends she wasn’t when she looks up suddenly from her palm and catches her in the act. The lollipop in her mouth suddenly feels too awkward, but there’s not much else she can do with it at the moment, so she sucks at it hesitantly until the girl finishes counting, glad to have something to do with her hands for a moment.

 

  The coins are cold in her far too warm palm, and she doesn’t even bother counting them out to ensure it’s the right amount before putting the change straight into the drawer. Focuses on the rustling of the bag in the customers hands as she makes her way out of the store.

 

  “Have a good night!”

 

  The shuffling pauses. Momo swallows at the small wave (with the carton of orange juice still in hand) and soft smile that gets thrown at her over her shoulder.

 

  “You too.”

 

  The bell chimes. The door closes, and Momo slumps against the counter-top in relief. 

 

  Okay. So yeah, maybe she made herself look like a complete idiot in front of a cute stranger who she’s probably never going to see again, but hey - she asked for some excitement on this otherwise completely stale Tuesday night. She was a worthwhile distraction for all of five minutes though, so Momo should be grateful for that at least. She glances up at the clock on the wall, groaning when she sees that the whole ordeal hadn’t even taken three. 

 

  One hour and fifty six minutes to go. She walks onto the shop floor to grab a magazine from the rack with a groan. She did it for a distraction, she reasons later as she’s locking up the store and walking the two streets back home with the keys jingling in her pocket and her backpack slung over her shoulder, completely ignoring the fact that she’d hardly even gotten five pages into the cheesy gossip tabloid. No, instead she’d been far too busy thinking about pretty lips and warm eyes.

 

  It wasn’t a bad way to pass the time at all, she thinks, taking the stairs up to her apartment two at a time despite the fatigue spreading through her system, opening the door and flicking on the light to see Nayeon sprawled attractively on her couch, mouth wide open and snoring loud enough that she could barely hear the action movie playing on the TV. 

 

  Another day done, she rolls her eyes, unzipping her bag to take the milk out as she walks past the couch, placing the cold bottle against the exposed skin of Nayeon’s stomach and not hanging around after the loud shriek she’d emitted at the unexpected attack. She shuts the door to her bedroom and the undignified curses get muffled through the thin, shitty material, slinging her backpack somewhere, anywhere in the corner of her room before slumping face first onto her bed. Bunches the sheets in her hands and doesn’t even bother to change out of her street clothes, just throws off the hoodie somewhere onto the floor and sleeps atop the blankets in a shirt and her shorts. 

 

  It’s been a long day, she inhales her own scent in the sheets. She could do with washing them, might do it tomorrow if she has time. But right now, she needs to sleep so she isn’t completely numb in her early morning class tomorrow. 

 

  She isn’t sure why, but she’s not really able to explain the smile that sneaks onto her face as she tucks her head in place against the pillow. Just another night. But maybe a little better. 

 

* * *

 

 

  Another night, another shift.

 

  It’s the same old repetitive cycle like every other night. She could do with putting out a few more trays of drinks, and maybe stocking up on the canned soup, but she has at least another three hours to go until the store closes, so she’ll resign herself to that menial task later. The usual night owls had already came in to get their fix of instant food, or snacks, or another can of booze and there hadn’t been another body in the store for the last twenty minutes. This was good for her though, because this time she had homework to catch up on and a mostly charged phone with a single earphone trailing up her collar. The night passes a little quicker when you’re trying to draft up hypothetical business plans and Britney’s singing in your ear, and she can’t help but hum along as she jots down notes for potential models. 

 

  This assignments not due for another week or so though, she’s just trying to get it done as early as possible so she doesn’t have to fret when the deadline gets closer. She’s also been distracting herself with sudoku puzzles in one of those cheap, tacky tabloid magazines, and at this rate she’ll close up and be home in bed before she knows it. Writes a quick ‘nine’ in the one square to complete the line, bobbing her head in time to the song as she moves onto the next one.

 

  The bell above the door chimes and a quick glance at the clock tells her it’s just a little after midnight. She looks up in time to see whoever walked in make a beeline straight to the drinks fridge again and rolls her eyes, getting straight back to the pressing matter at hand - solving her seventh puzzle of the night. Wait, fuck - the empty square here should be a six, but she already put a six in the same square earlier… she scrunches her brows irritably. She should have used a pencil. 

 

  “You put two fours’ in that square.”

 

  A slender finger taps on the paper and at the offending number four that had screwed up her whole puzzle. She crosses it out quickly, putting the correct four in the other square and getting one number closer to finishing this thing off.

 

  “Thanks.” She follows the finger on her page up to look at the owner, only to blanch at the sight of pretty, curved lips smiling at her in amusement.

 

  “No problem.”

 

  She quickly shoves everything on the counter to the side, ignoring the fact that she just shoved all of her notes without arranging them. A few fell on the floor, and she could see at least three pages that got crumpled by the gum display they’d been pushed next to, but she focused more on the fact that she had a customer waiting for her to do her job.

 

  A very cute customer. One who was smiling at her coyly as she handed over her items and leaned a little closer over the counter than necessary. 

 

  She was dressed differently today. Last time she’d been drowning in an oversized hoodie and comfy sweatpants, the pure embodiment of exhaustion as she’d stood at the counter underneath the ugly fluorescent lighting. Momo liked to refer to that as the ‘true self’ - the side that nobody really sees of you, except the cashier at your local corner shop at two am. Sure, everyone seemed to be doing okay on the outside - but in this convenience store Momo knew the truth. She knew people’s greatest secrets, saw their most intimate self. Has seen exhaustion in its truest form, and it usually comes in the shape of another tired body shuffling through the door just a few minutes before closing. 

 

  Just like this girl, a little over three weeks ago.

 

  This time though she’s wearing some sort of gym attire underneath her unzipped hoodie. Tight and form fitting, a complete contrast to the clothes she was wearing before, but Momo supposes everyone has many sides to them. She’s still wearing the glasses though, but this time her hood’s pulled down and her light brown hair’s been tied up into a messy, high ponytail. 

 

  It’s ridiculously attractive, especially when Momo didn’t have her guard up anyway.

 

  She scans the items through. Tries to focus on the dull, jarringly loud beep of the archaic scanner as she does so she doesn’t make a fool of herself like before, and to her credit it kind of works. Until she takes a look at what she’s scanning and her stupid mouth makes its own decisions.

 

  “No orange this time?” 

 

  The girls eyes widen in surprise, obviously not expecting Momo to have really remembered her, and especially not the flavour of juice one customer had bought three weeks ago. She isn’t sure if it’s a good reaction, so Momo smiles. Widely. Awkwardly. 

 

  “No, you guys are out of orange.”

 

  Ah. Maybe she should have restocked the drinks fridge earlier. She mentally berates herself as the girl hands over the money for her items (counted out to the exact penny, her heart almost swoons) and Momo pops open the till. She could run out back right now and rifle through the stock cupboard for a single can of orange juice, but that feels a little too desperate and awkward, and as socially inept as Momo is she’s not  _ that _ bad. 

 

  She sucks on the lollipop in her mouth and can almost feel the metaphorical light bulb appear above her head.

 

  “Here!” She rummages in the plastic tub in front of her until she finds what she’s looking for, holding out the gaudy little blue and orange wrapped lollipop decorated with clip art cartoon oranges. “To make up for me being a bad worker.” 

 

  The girl blinks slowly, before her face splits into an unmistakably amused grin. She takes the offered sweet and unwraps it there, popping it into her mouth with a satisfied grin as the taste hits her tongue. 

 

  “Thanks,” She grabs her items off of the counter, not bothering with a bag and starts walking out towards the door. She pauses before she reaches it, a reminiscent scene of three weeks ago and looks back over her shoulder. Gives Momo that same, small wave and soft smile, hand clutching a carton of blackcurrant juice and pushing her glasses more firmly up the bridge of her nose with her knuckles. “Goodnight Momo!” 

 

  And the bell above the door chimes. And she’s gone again. And it takes Momo a solid thirty seconds to remember how to breathe after that, even though all she did was read her name tag and say good night to her with that quiet, gentle voice. Plenty of customers say her name to her, and for the most part she hates it because it’s usually sleazy drunk jerks trying to get her number, or people trying to plead with her to let them get away with not having the extra twenty cents to pay for their stuff. 

 

  But now she just feels kind of warm. A little too excited for a slow Friday night, and way too optimistic about a cute girl who may or may not start to become a regular in this rundown convenience store. 

 

  She bites down on the lollipop in her mouth, chewing through the fragmented pieces until the strawberry taste in her mouth had almost faded. Reaches into the tub for another one. Smiles when the sharp, tangy taste of citrus overpowers the strawberry sweetness clinging to her tongue.

 

  She runs a hand through her hair, ruffling it into a mess and almost giddy with elation. She’s never known how to handle her excitement, not really, and so she just clenches and unclenches her hands in some sort of effort to calm down. She might have let out a small yell into the empty shop too, but who’s going to judge her when the only response she gets is the ever present hum of the fridge and a car passing by outside?

 

  Deep breaths. It was just a pretty girl. And all she did was give her a lollipop - it’s not like she vaulted the counter and got down on one knee right there and then. 

 

  Still…

 

  One last big, dramatic sigh to get everything out of her system before she bends down to pick up the scattered remnants of her model drafts from the floor, flattening out the creases and silently apologizing to the paper as she rearranged it next to the till once more. Another glance at the clock tells her there’s still a while to go yet, and call it cheesy, but she doesn’t feel quite so pessimistic about the hands on the clock face dragging every single second out tortuously.

 

  Until she goes back to her sudoku puzzle, only to find she accidentally put a double five in the one line and she has no idea which one is the wrong one.

 

  God fucking damn it. 

 

* * *

 

 

  Her next shift at the store is a pleasant change.

 

  She’d been halfway through her day off when a call came through from Mr Kim - apparently he was training up his grand daughter to work in the shop to replace Dowoon (who left to play in a band, she thinks, and honestly she wishes him the best of luck) but some sort of emergency came up which meant he had to travel three hours South to be with another family member immediately.

 

  Which, obviously meant his very inexperienced grand daughter would be the only person running the shop. And, as much as Momo wanted to lie in bed and watch reruns of Sailor Moon all day, she also felt  _ some _ responsibility to the rundown little store. So she’d thrown back the covers, dressed herself to a somewhat publicly respectable degree and is now seven boxes deep in their storage cupboard trying to find a certain flavour of kit-kat that she  _ knows _ isn’t even in production anymore, but this customer is being horrendously troublesome over it and she’d never let someone as new and untainted by the service industry as Dahyun deal with some dickbag like that on her first day.

 

  She slips and her foot goes through a box of marshmallows. At least it was something squishy, and not a case of beer or something. She quickly sends up a prayer to some higher being that the prudish old twat fucks off in the time it takes her to extract herself from the jumbled boxes (she  _ really _ should mention to the old man about clearing the place out or something). There’s voices coming from the front of the store, and if they weren’t so soft spoken they’d have given her cause for concern because in coming out back she  _ did _ leave Dahyun alone with that irate customer. But it just sounds like normal conversation. 

 

  She finally finds her balance and kicks an empty box further back in the deep recesses of the closet. Brushes the stray traces of broken cardboard off of her leg and starts to make her way back to the front, putting on her best customer service face and rehearsing her sorry a couple of dozen times before she got there. 

 

  ‘ _ I’m sorry Sir but we don’t have any.’ _

 

_   ‘I’m terribly sorry but we don’t seem to have any.’ _

 

_   ‘We haven’t got any, now fuck off.’ _

 

__ She crushes the temptation to choose the last one way,  _ waaaay _ deep in her chest, reluctantly settling on the first option and steeling herself for the imminent huffing and puffing and possible insults she’d get in return.

 

  Ah, retail. The joys.

 

  At least she was here, in a privately owned corner shop where she had a lot of control over what she did and what she said, as opposed to some big ass franchise store where she would be little more than an autonomous robot.

 

  You know what, Mr Kim probably wouldn’t mind if she said the last option. A grin steals its way across her face as she opens the door to the shop floor, fully prepared to give this guy a piece of her mind and-

 

  “Hi.” 

 

  Her mouth snaps shut. The insult halfway up her throat swallowed heavily and frantically and the result procuring some kind of half strangled noise of confusion. Because the person standing at the counter is definitely not the one she expected, but here she is - giving her a friendly wave and a smile that made her eyes disappear. 

 

  She has… a few questions. But her brain doesn’t seem to want to cooperate. She makes eye contact with Dahyun who, much to Momo’s relief, seems to be experiencing the same sort of flustered shock that she’s going through, looking anywhere except the beautiful girl beaming a megawatt smile at the both of them across the counter. 

 

  “Hey.” She gives her own wave back, before turning to Dahyun. “Where did the guy go?”

 

  She shuffles nervously on her feet, looking across the counter at the girl. “He uh, he left.”

 

  “Just like that?”

 

  “Well uh, actually, she kind of-“

 

  “I told him to fuck off.” The other girl shrugs her shoulders, as though it were no big deal.

 

  “Yeah,” Dahyun trails after a few moment, small smile sneaking its way onto her face. It’s only now Momo can see the complete relief in her actions, from the way she’s leaning heavily on the counter, and the shy blush fading gradually from her cheeks. “That.” 

 

  Three things struck Momo at that moment.

 

  First, this overwhelming sense of awe and envy, because she’d give her left arm (and that was her favourite) to have been the one to tell that crotchety, over entitled asshat to fuck off. Secondly, maybe a little bit of admiration. And instant, time stopping infatuation that punched her straight in the gut and gave her no room to argue as it nestled snugly in between her ribs. 

 

  Third…

 

  “I came in and he was being a dick, so I just…” she shrugs again, jerking her thumb towards the door, “told him to fuck off.”

 

  She isn’t sure how to label the third thing, but she knows it has something to do with the barely there smile on her face that she’s had since she locked eyes with Momo. And the way she hasn’t stopped looking at her since. 

 

  “Thank you…”

 

  “Sana.”

 

  “Thank you, Sana.” Momo grins, toothy and genuine, and the grin Sana returns is almost enough to have her tripping over invisible boxes again. It’s definitely enough to have her tugging at her ear, an old, nervous habit that she’s had for as long as she can remember, one that Jeongyeon has relentlessly bullied her about since they first met almost two years ago.

 

_ You’re so obvious _ , she’d tease,  _ such a dork _ , she’d coo. Yeah, well, her ears might go red and she might not be able to hide her emotions as easily as other people, but  _ she’s _ not the one who had a three month plan drawn out just so they could ask out their current girlfriend. Jeongyeon of all people had  _ no _ right to call her a dork, and Momo knows that Chaeyoung would agree with her, albeit with far more love and affection than she’d say it.

 

  Besides, her last girlfriend though the action was cute. And Momo maintains that stance whenever Jeong decides to be an ass about it. 

 

  It seems Sana thinks so too, judging from the way her eyes crinkle into little slits and a smile stretches her lips all the way into her cheeks. So, it may be a  _ little _ dorky, but hey, she’s cute. 

 

  Dahyun glances between them curiously. Just a little too much intuition hiding behind wide, deceptively naive eyes for Momo’s liking. She makes a show out of checking the time on her wrist watch, despite the clock on the wall directly in front of them, and takes long, hurried strides towards the back room.

 

  “Time for my break! You can handle this one Unnie!” 

 

  The younger girl is about as subtle as a bull in a china shop, and her sudden (and not at all obvious) disappearance coats both of the remaining bodies in the shop with a layer of awkwardness. And maybe a dash of anticipation, sprinkled with hesitation of the unknown, neither of them knowing what to do next. 

 

  The girl - Sana, her name is  _ Sana,  _ raises the items in her hand with a small cough. Tops it off with another cavity inducing smile as she puts them on the counter and Momo doesn’t even pause to consider what she’s about to do when she gently pushes the items back into her hands, taking advantage of her surprise to slip a lollipop in there too. 

 

  “It’s on the house.”

 

  God, she’s always wanted to say that. She doesn’t have time to bask in the satisfaction though because Sana is insistent.

 

  “Let me pay.”

 

  “It’s fine, really.”

 

  “I insist.”

 

  “It’s not a lot, seriously. Don’t worry about it.”

 

  (It’s $3.67 to be exact. Not that she remembers, or anything.) 

 

  Sana scowls at her, stubborn and playful and still determined to shove the coins in her hand into Momo’s. Her mouth’s halfway open when a ringtone trills out from her pocket, loud and disruptive and it’s enough to steal her attention away for a moment so Momo can collect herself.

 

  “It’s fine. I promise. I’m not gonna get in trouble for a couple of bucks.”

 

  She really wouldn’t. Especially because she knows she’s just going to slip just enough of her own money into the till later to balance it out. 

 

  The phone continues to ring between them, and there’s a moment Sana glances between her, the phone, and the money in her hand. She signs dejectedly, pocketing the money with great reluctance and aiming one last dagger like glare towards Momo. 

 

  Who grins uncontrollably. 

 

  “I’m paying double next time.”

 

  Next time.  _ Next time.  _ The words play on a broken, tangled loop inside her head as the other girl fishes her phone out of her pocket, swiping to connect the call and bringing the device up to her ear. The last action was unnecessary, because whoever was on the other end of the receiver was loud, loud enough for Momo to hear clearly too, and apparently very,  _ very _ pissed off. 

 

  “ _ WHERE ARE YOU?” _

 

__ Sana and Momo both wince at the sheer volume of the voice coming out of the tinny receiver, Sana’s hand shooting out reflexively to hold the phone as far away from her ear as possible. 

 

  “I’m at the convenience store.”

 

  “The one near-“

 

  “Yes, yes,” Sana cuts her friend off, “the one near your ‘sort-of-but-not-really’ girlfriend’s place.” 

 

  A pause. Then a shuffle, and a sigh, irritation bleeding through the call despite whoever’s on the other end being at least a few miles away. 

 

  “I don’t know why you keep going to that one recently when we live across town but whatever, get your ass back here soon you promised to help me with my paper!” 

 

  Sana rushes out a goodbye, ending the call as quickly as possible and Momo thinks it has something to do with the fact that her friend exposed at least two things in that short exchange.

 

  1. Sana lived all the way on the other side of town, which, if the other girl hadn’t been exaggerating, was at least a forty minute walk away. 
  2. Sana’s decision to go to this store over the countless ones Momo knew existed much closer to where she lived was apparently a recent development. Perhaps, maybe only a month recent.



 

  What a convenient time frame to start going to a certain shop. It coincides perfectly with about the same time they first- 

 

  Sana coughs lightly, a light pink blush dusting her cheeks as she looks at the floor. 

 

  “I’ve got to go. See you again?”

 

  “Yeah.” Momo nods, only just able to keep back the excitement from spilling over like an untrained puppy, “See you again.” 

 

  And she leaves. Except this time she hesitates, fumbles her usually smooth exit and waves goodbye quickly. It’s probably an effort to hide the blush that crept onto her cheeks at the end of that phone call, and Momo’s heart does astronomical somersaults in her chest at how it takes her at least three attempts to push the door open before she succeeds. 

 

  The bell chimes. The door closes. It takes Momo a solid three minutes to realise Dahyun’s leaning against the doorway watching her, and even then it was only because the younger girl coughed pointedly. And then it hits her.

 

  “Unnie…”

 

  “Oh my God…” 

 

  “Momo Unnie…”

 

  “She was… she was  _ flirting _ with me? I mean, no, not  _ really _ but like that was definitely  _ something _ right? Like I’m not just imagining this and I’m completely delusional… right?” 

 

  “Momo-“

 

  “And I flirted BACK. What if she was just being friendly? She only came in for some orange juice and a chocolate bar and instead she has to put up with my lame ass making her uncomfortable-“

 

  “MOMO!” 

 

  She didn’t think it was possible for such a loud shout to come from the timid girl who’d barely spoken to her all afternoon asides from casual pleasantries, and it’s enough to startle her out of the endless loop of nervous rambling she’d started. (Which was also one of her many bad habits that Jeongyeon bullied her for.) Momo’s pretty certain she surprised herself too - as soon as she makes eye contact with her she remembers herself, and that Momo’s her senior and a few years older than her and smiles sheepishly. 

 

  Not that Momo’s ever actually cared about seniority in the slightest. A friend is a friend, no matter the age, and she hopes that Dahyun feels comfortable enough with her soon. 

 

  “I uh, I’m not an expert or anything but I’m  _ pretty _ certain she’s interested. Or at least finds you cute.”

 

  Momo stills. “What makes you think that?”

 

  “She definitely looks at you like she’s interested,” she chuckles, “And you  _ are _ pretty cute.” Huh. Didn’t expect that vein of boldness underneath her shy smile. “That, and she also asked about you when we were talking after she told that guy where to go.”

 

  Her eyebrows nearly shot into her hairline. “She did?”

 

  “Mm hmm, she asked me if I was new, and of course I said yes but someone else was here training me, and she got kind of… hopeful? And asked me if it was you, so of course I said  _ yeah _ , and then she got the  _ biggest _ grin on her face, oh man.” Dahyun chuckles, and Momo can’t help but to smile with her.

 

  “So I just like, assumed that she was your girlfriend-“

 

  “ _ Oh no.” _

 

_   “ _ And I asked her like ‘are you her girlfriend?’-“

 

  “Oh God  _ why.” _

 

__ “And to her credit she only blushed a little bit. But then you came out and, yeah. It was kind of obvious you weren’t dating but also like…” She trails off, either not knowing how to phrase her next sentence or just not able to think of the words. She makes a vague wiggly gesture with her hand, one that makes Momo feel...something.

 

  “Liiiiiiike?” She prompts.

 

  “Liiiiiiike, there was something there.” Dahyun drums her fingers along the counter top, lips pursed and brows furrowed in thought.

 

  “You think so?” 

 

  “Yeah.” The finality and resound resolution in the younger girl’s voice has Momo believing it for a moment.

 

  “So you think… I should…?”

 

  Dahyun hums thoughtfully. Encouragingly. “I mean come on, what’s the worst that can happen?”

 

  “I embarrass myself and creep her out and she never comes into this shop again and I live with the crushing guilt of my awkward assumptions.”

 

  Dahyun blinks in surprise. “Ooookay. I mean, I  _ guess _ that’s an option, but also unlikely. Why don’t you just try and talk to her more next time she comes in? She  _ did _ say she’s coming in again.”

 

  Momo’s cheeks warm at the reminder, because Sana  _ did _ say that. Whilst blushing. And refusing to make eye contact. She feels a lot lighter.

 

  “Yeah. You’re right. I’ll talk to her next time she comes in.”

 

  She gets a blinding grin in response, wide and full of teeth as the younger girl shoots her two encouraging thumbs up. Momo’s half tempted to pull the tiny student into a hug, because she needs to do something to get rid of this excitement in her body and a good, bone crushing hug is usually the most effective way. But she only just met her today, and as friendly as Dahyun is she thinks it might make things awkward. That, and she’s a little worried about hurting her if she gets dragged into one of Momo’s infamous bear hugs. 

 

  She doesn’t have to worry though, because the bell chimes above the door and both of their heads snap toward the sound, relaxing for different reasons when they see it's just one of the regular customers coming in for their daily fix of snacks. Dahyun moves to go behind the register but Momo shoos her away, telling her she can go on her break and that she can take all the time she needs. Maybe she’s a little too enthusiastic to have the younger girl gone, because Dahyun squints at her suspiciously over her shoulder as she all but pushes her through the back door, pausing in the doorway to grin deviously and say one last thing before she disappears.

 

  “Don’t worry Unnie, I’ll take all the time you need.”

 

  Momo smiles guiltily. She really isn’t very good at hiding her emotions or intentions, and she’s not surprised Dahyun sussed her out straight away. The door closes behind her, and simultaneously Momo lets out all the air that had been building in her chest in one, long, heavy exhale. 

 

  The customer shuffling between the shelf looks at her curiously at the sound, and Momo just plasters on her big, polite customer service smile. It’s not nearly as hard as it usually is though, and even after she’s scanned through his instant noodles and has waved him goodbye as he pushes open the outside door, the smile’s still there. 

 

  Huh. That’s new. She shakes off the thought, returning to the pressing matter at hand.

 

  What the hell was she going to say to Sana next time she comes in?

 

  Alright, She weighs up her options in her mind. Nayeon’s her best friend, but would also never let her live this down for the rest of her life so she rules her out. Same with Jeongyeon, except she’d have more mocking imitations and would probably be even more embarrassing. She could go to Chaeng, but there’s the dangerous chance Jeongyeon would find out, and that’s not happening.

 

  She sighs. Chaeng gave really good advice too. It was a shame she was dating such a goblin. 

 

  She pulls out her phone, scrolling through the small list of contacts until she got to the name she was looking for. 

 

**Momoring**

 

Hey Minari :)

 

**Minari~**

 

Hey Momoring! What’s up?

 

**Momoring**

 

Just, need some advice I think? Nothing serious I just… want to talk to a girl

 

**Minari~**

 

Must be serious if you’re messaging me for advice haha

 

**Momoring**

 

  Or I’m just useless with girls

 

**Minari~**

 

I mean, that too :)

 

  Momo grins as the message comes through, already typing out a reply. Somehow she thinks she’ll be fine.

 

* * *

 

 

  Another night, another shift. 

 

  The drinks fridge still hums obstinately in the corner - it’s all Momo can hear besides the lull of distant traffic and the tap of her foot on the old linoleum floor. It’s just like every other night in the store, except Momo’s hopeful. Expectant, even. Waiting with bright eyes that snap towards the door with every signature trill of the bell as someone comes in. Dimming just a little when she sees it’s not the face she’s waiting for.

 

  That’s okay. She doesn’t come in every night, Momo can’t expect her to appear straight away just like magic. That’s not how real life works. 

 

  She smiles, scans her customers items and watches each one leave with a smile that doesn’t come as easy as she’d like. Tries to pretend she’s not as disappointed as the heavy weight in her chest tells her she is when she locks up the shop and goes home with no trace of the other girl.

 

  She sinks into her bed, taking deep breaths of the freshly washed sheets as she succumbs to sleep. 

 

  It’s okay. There’s always another night.

 

* * *

 

 

  Another night, another shift. And another. And another.

 

  And still no trace of Sana.

 

  It’s fine, she tells herself. Though she can’t help but to worry. Maybe the other girl just has better things to do than to trek halfway across the city for awkward small talk and a carton of orange juice. 

 

  It’s not like Momo had much more to offer than that really. She was just… a corner store worker, who pulls the late night shift and goes to college and goes straight back home. The bell chimes and she looks up, sighing slightly when she recognises the teenage girl who lives near her block of apartments come in with a few friends. 

 

  Whatever, she thinks, steeling herself to stand up straight and smile politely as the gaggle of teens make their way towards the counter.

 

  It’s not a big deal anyway. 

 

* * *

 

 

  The news forecast says that there’s a storm coming soon, nowhere near a typhoon but supposedly strong enough to warn people to stay indoors and with the promise of enough rain to fill the reservoirs after the unprecedentedly warm summer. Nayeon tells her as such, and by tells her that means the older girl strolled through her front door like she owned the place (Momo had long given up on getting the locks changed, she’s actually not sure how she keeps getting ahold of another copy of the key and, honestly - she’s a little scared to ask) and threw herself on top of her as she lay on the couch reading a textbook, thrusting her phone between the book and Momo’s face so she’d have no choice but to read the screen. 

 

  She’d squinted blearily at the proximity, taking a good ten seconds just to read the title of the imminent bad weather and another twenty to read the rest of the forecast. Nayeon hummed impatiently, still laying her full weight on top of her as she appeared indifferent. 

 

  “You should take a jacket to work later, and maybe an umbrella too.”

 

  Indifference never really settled right with Nayeon though, and Momo grins at the faux display of nonchalance as the older girl pretends to inspect her nails. Momo pushes the phone aside, sounding out an agreeable hum and the weight of Nayeon’s body on her own disappears. 

 

  “Oh, and maybe sneak me some of those little fudge brownies?”

 

  Momo laughs. “You’ve gotten a real sweet tooth for those recently.”

 

  Nayeon laughs too but it’s sharp, a little off. She smiles brightly.  _ Too _ brightly. “Yeah, they taste really good.”

 

  Momo just hums, putting an end to the conversation and letting the older girl walk back out the door. She’s in the doorway when Momo calls out to her, thumbing disinterestedly through her book.

 

  “Do you want me to get enough for your girlfriend too?”

 

  Nayeon physically grinds to a halt as the ‘G’ word leaves her mouth. Momo could practically see the imaginary breaks her mind just slammed on at being caught. She sees Nayeon play through a cycle of responses in her head; denial, rebuttal, laughing perhaps. Waving it off as a joke and calling Momo crazy for even insinuating such a thing.

 

  But Momo wasn’t stupid, and despite always being busy with college work or pulling shifts at the store, she did pay attention to her best friend. And how little she seemed to just waltz into her apartment nowadays, and how often she would catch her smiling like a fool down at her phone. All the sudden disappearances to the other side of town ‘just to get some air’ but Chaeyoung texted her the other day asking ‘when did Nayeon get such a pretty girlfriend?’ because the younger girl had seen Nayeon sitting in a cafe with a mystery girl. 

 

  Nayeon sighed in defeat, choosing her least favourite option. Acceptance. 

 

  “She’s not my girlfriend. Yet” She mumbled sullenly.

 

  “Mm. Yet.” Momo teased, looking at the time on her phone with a sigh. She snapped the book in her hand shut, walking into her bedroom to grab her uniform to start getting ready for her shift tonight. “I’ll get you as many fudge brownies as I can.”

 

  She throws a glance over her shoulder and sees Nayeon’s relieved smile, though she’s not sure what for. “Thanks Momo. Don’t forget your jacket!”

 

  Momo peers through the small window in her bedroom at the slowly approaching clouds of grey in the sky, dark, heavy rain clouds coming in from the South that would no doubt drench her on her way back home tonight if they didn’t pass quickly. She hears the front door slam shut (Nayeon never did quiet entrances or exits) and decides to grab her textbook and put it in her bag, along with some of her other work. Who knows? Maybe tonight would be a slow one. 

 

* * *

 

 

  She was right. Another night. Another painfully, dreadfully slow shift. 

 

  She hadn’t seen a soul in the past thirty minutes. Not a single one - mostly because of the torrential onslaught of rain hammering down on the city for the past twenty minutes or so, but even before that the store had been dead. 

 

  Save for that quiet college student who came in and bought a good months supply of their instant ramen. She watched him struggle out the door with a vague sense of admiration as he juggled the cups he couldn’t fit in a bag in his arms, almost envying him as he scurried back to his dorm as quickly as possible before the storm hit. She hopes his accommodation wasn’t  _ too _ far away, because it had barely been ten minutes after he left before the heavens opened.

 

  And she means  _ really _ opened, like, at least two entire months worth of rainfall within the first twenty minutes. And hard enough for Momo to hear faint shrieking of unfortunate pedestrians who hadn’t been aware or who’d tried to brave their chances on the walk home, and for the sound of the rain hitting the asphalt to completely drown out the noise of the fridge in the corner. And that old thing was  _ loud, _ so Momo could only imagine how much louder it actually was listening to the rain outside. 

 

  She’s fortunate that her brain kicked into the right gear in time for her to slam the window shut and pull the latch to. The gutter above it has a tendency to burst, and the last time it had rained there’d been an unplanned waterfall streaming down the window pane and into the shop itself. Somehow shutting the window just made the rain impossibly louder, raindrops smashing against the thin glass with more strength than Momo had felt in weeks now. 

 

  It was oddly soothing, despite the horrendously loud racket. It was repetitive, and consistent, and the sharp tap of every single drop hitting the glass multiplied by a thousand times was calming and reassuring. There’s some poeticism hidden behind the feeling somewhere, but she’d rather focus on the fact that her coursework is absolutely, positively, irreparably screwed.

 

  The storm currently holding most of the city at bay right now was working most favourably for her, because it meant she could entirely focus on going over the sheets her group mates have handed her thus far on their shared assignment. 

 

  Unfortunately, that also meant that she had to go through every page and see just how incredibly unwilling any of them were to actually contribute to the work. And also see just how little attention all of them had been paying throughout the two years they’d already been on this course. 

 

  God she fucking  _ hated _ group work. 

 

  But, not for the first time, Momo would be the one to fix their mistakes and pick up the slack because unlike them, she actually  _ wanted _ to graduate with a degree and do something with it. Maybe she’d speak to her professor and ask whether she could join another group or, hell, even be her own group and do all the work herself. Which was basically what she was doing anyway, except that option meant she wasn’t carrying her useless, lazy group-mates on her back.

 

  She didn’t mind being a good person, but there was a difference between helping someone out and being taken advantage of. And like every other lesson she’d had, she’d learned that the hard way.

 

  She shakes off the bad thoughts. Sighs when she reads through a page to see they hadn’t even gotten the simple maths equations right for God's sake. No. She wasn’t putting herself through this torture tonight, not when the weather was already so terrible and not helping to uplift her mood at all.

 

  Her hand finds its own way into the jar of lollipops, fishing around mindlessly until it pulls out an orange flavoured one. She sighs, unwrapping it reluctantly to put it in her mouth and trying not to wince at the sharp taste of citrus on her tongue.

 

  It wasn’t that she didn’t like it, it just took a while to get used to the flavour. Momo liked sweet things, tastes that curled into your mouth and stuck to your gums long after the food had disappeared, strawberry gum drops and mounds and mounds of cotton candy. But the orange was refreshing and revitalizing, pulling her out of the semi-hazy drowsy state she’d been induced into by the rain, and the mind numbing work sheets she’d been going over for the past few minutes.

 

  The clock on the wall says that it’s barely even ten. Which means the store’s supposed to be open for another four hours or so. 

 

  She takes her phone out. There’s no way anyone’s going to come out to this little convenience store in this bad weather, and it’d probably save a lot more money if they shut up shop now and cut down on running costs. She’s halfway through typing out a message to the old man when the bell above the door rings.

 

  No fucking way.

 

  Who on Earth would even attempt to-

 

  She looks up from her phone, eyes widening with shock when she takes in the sight in front of her. 

 

  Sana grins at her cheerfully.

 

  “Hi.”

 

  She’s soaked. Completely and utterly drenched from head to toe, a little puddle forming underneath her as she stands in front of the door. She’s not even wearing a coat, instead wearing a light grey hoodie that’s now almost black with how saturated it is, and a pair of denim shorts that, at the very least seem to have been mostly spared by the rain gods. 

 

  Momo doesn’t really know what to say. So she lets her mouth choose to go off unfiltered.

 

  “What in the world are you doing here?”

 

  Sana shrugs, the small action making her clothes squelch and Momo couldn’t even begin to imagine how uncomfortable they felt. She sniffed before she replied, noticeably shivering.

 

  “I-“

 

  “No no no no no no no,” Momo hops over the counter, taking firm strides towards the other girl and wrapping her fingers around her soggy sleeve covered wrist, “You’re getting warm before anything else, you’re gonna die from the cold otherwise.”

 

  Sana looks at her curiously, before nodding quietly, not having much protest in her tired limbs as she lets Momo drag her into the back room, sitting obediently on the single chair they have out back as Momo rummages through the cupboards.

 

  “I know we have towels here somewhere,” she murmurs more to herself as she tears the cupboards apart, missing the bemused smile that tugs at Sana’s lips as she watches her. She turns her head to look at the soaked girl, cheeks slightly pink. “You uh, you might want to get out of those clothes.”

 

  Sana smirks despite the lack of colour in her lips, looking at Momo with a teasing glint in her eyes. “A little forward.”

 

  “Nooooo,” Momo whines, eyes scrunched shut and Sana giggles softly. “You know what I mean. I have a hoodie in my bag if you want that?”

 

  She replies with another nod, taking the offered bag and taking the hoodie out. Takes the towel that Momo finds a moment later with an impossibly small ‘thank you’ that Momo wants to reply to but suddenly words are far too difficult to say, so she nods back almost imperceptibly and leans against the counter-top - trying not to look like she’s trying  _ too _ hard to look good, but also, maybe, trying to look good. Just a little bit.

 

  Sana coughs gently, lips tugging up into that undeniably endearing smile that Momo’s slowly learning is synonymous to trouble and glances pointedly between the towel and her own wet clothes. Coughs again, this time louder and with more purpose and Momo realises that she has to actually let the other girl get changed somewhere in private.

 

  “Oh, yeah, of course,” She panics, trying to laugh it off coolly but she’s never been able to tame the telltale red that burns on her cheeks, “The bathroom’s just behind that door.”

 

  She gets another quiet thank you, but with the promise of laughter bubbling underneath and Momo figures she’d continue to make a fool of herself if only to hear the sound again. The door clicks shut behind her and she just - starts to freak out.

 

  Sana was here.

 

  In the store. With her.

 

  After walking across town in one of the worst storms they’ve had for years and all she had to say was ‘hi’?

 

  Momo clutches her head in her hands, shifting her weight from feet to feet as disbelief exploded through her whole body. She hoped Sana couldn’t hear her ministrations through the door, because  _ what the fuck? _

 

  No.

 

  No. There had to be more to it than just that. 

 

  ...Surely?

 

  She briefly considers texting someone, anyone, hell even Jeong in this situation. But she’s got to push her gay panic aside, because first and foremost - she has to make sure Sana’s as comfortable as possible. 

 

  She darts across the tiny room to the radiator, cranking it all the way up to max so the poor girl wouldn’t catch a death from cold, jumping back to the other side after to make sure the windows were tightly sealed and throwing the cushion that had  _ definitely _ seen better days onto the lonely looking chair that she’d been sat in.

 

  She thinks. She really,  _ really  _ thinks about what else to do.

 

  Tea.

 

  Kind eyes. Warm Tea.

 

  That’s what she can give her.

 

  The mundane routine of making tea calms her considerably, tuning into the faint sound of the rain hitting the rooftop and listening to the clink of the mugs hitting the sink as she swilled them out. Taking in deep breaths of the jasmine infused tea that rose into the air after she poured the boiling water in, feeling all the tenseness that had been seizing up her shoulders slipping away in a contented hum. One clink of the spoon against the mug, a second just to be safe. 

 

  Wait. The shop’s still open. She can still hear the sounds of Sana shuffling about in the bathroom, so she jogs out to the store front and puts the deadbolt across the front door, turning the little ‘open’ sign around to ‘closed’ just for good measure. Not that she thinks anyone would even try to come to the shop in this weather, but the girl toweling off half a storm’s worth of rain in their cramped bathroom was evidence enough to have her take extra measures. 

  She returns to the little kitchen area dragging an unopened box of chocolate bars with her, intent on using it as a makeshift stool so she wouldn’t have to sit on the floor. Usually there was only one person out here at a time, so having one chair wasn’t a problem, but…

 

  The bathroom door opens with a familiar, horridly janky screech just as she’s about to turn around, so she does so and is nowhere near prepared for the sight of Sana in her hoodie.

 

  Her big one. The ridiculously, oversized and more than overworn faded purple plain hoodie that she’d bought at least three years ago now, a little piece of home that she brought with her when she started her course and moved away. The one that positively engulfs Sana’s slight frame in all it’s excess fabric and long sleeves, reaching all the way down to her knees and pooling almost comically around her shoulders. Momo thinks the other girl is a few inches taller than her, but right now standing in the doorway in a hoodie at least five sizes too big for her she looks so tiny and adorable and… yeah, okay, maybe this was a problem.

 

  Momo’s cotton candy heart was only so strong.

 

  She sniffs again,scrunching her nose as she does and shuffles into the room with her wet hoodie and t-shirt in hand, a little sheepish, maybe more than a little bit out of place. Momo takes them and places them on top of the radiator to dry them out, gesturing for Sana to sit back down and handing her the tea when she settles with a comfortable sigh. And yes, she absolutely did use the best mug they had in the store, which only had one barely noticeable chip on the handle.

 

  Nothing but the best to impress. 

 

  Cold numbed fingers wrap around the warm ceramic with a pleasant hiss of relief, Momo watching as the other girl burrows deeper into the confines of the hoodie and  _ somehow _ looks even smaller than before. She lets her take a few, small tentative sips of the hot drink before she talks, giving her the chance to put some warmth back into her skin as Momo sits carefully on top of her box.

 

  “So, did you just forget that there was a storm coming or?”

 

  Sana laughs, smile half hidden by the rim of the mug. “Yes, actually.”

 

  “Oh.” Momo blinks, reaching for her own cup and sipping gingerly, ultimately deciding that it was too hot for now and just letting the heat warm her fingers.

 

  “It sounds stupid I know, but I spent the entire day holed up in my room writing an essay and by the time I came out my roommate had her girlfriend over, and I love her but I absolutely do not love witnessing her mushy phase at the beginning of a relationship.” Her nose wrinkles distastefully at the thought. “So I just grabbed my jacket and decided to grab some snacks but… clearly I didn’t think things through.”

 

  Momo hums teasingly. Doesn’t respond past a quirked eyebrow and a condescending smile and Sana sighs playfully.

 

  “Yeah I know. Definitely not my smartest move in the world. But by the time it started raining I was already most of the way here and it would have taken me longer to get back home… so here I am.”

 

  “Are your roommate and her girlfriend that bad that you’d literally walk through a storm over being in the same room as them?”

 

  “Oh they’re the  _ worst.”  _ She huffs irritably, cheeks blown full with air and it’s too cute to be good for Momo’s health. “First, they spend three months ‘dating’ even though they clearly are already and neither of them are brave enough to actually take the plunge and ask-“

 

  Momo snorts. “Sounds like someone I know.”

 

  “-and now they’ve almost sort of admitted they’re dating but they  _ STILL _ haven’t asked each other to be their girlfriend.” She punctuated the end of her tirade with a well practiced eye roll, taking another sip of her tea.

 

  “They’re really cute though,” she mutters begrudgingly, like the admittance had been forced out of her against her will, “I’ll give them that.”

 

  Momo blows gently on her tea, sitting back more comfortably on her makeshift stool so she could bring her knees up to her chest. “Not cute enough for you to stay in the same room as them though.”

 

  “I like my interactions with friends to stay within the definition of public decency, so no they’re absolutely not cute enough for me to sit there while they play footsie under the table.”

 

  She shudders dramatically and Momo chuckles at just how affected she seems to be by this.

 

  “Not a big fan of PDA?”

 

  Oh God. Oh  _ Momo _ . What the fuck are you  _ saying _ .

 

  Sana’s lips curl into her cheeks, taking a measured sip before responding.

 

  “Oh I love PDA. Just usually when it’s with me and someone else, not my best friend and her overly touchy girlfriend. Although, actually, they’re just as bad as each other.” 

 

  Okay. Crisis aborted. That wasn’t  _ too _ bad, Momo almost signs in relief. Silence settles between them like a warm blanket, the insistent rain a canopy of sound in the spaces between the silence along with the quiet sips they’d take of their drinks. Momo’s finger begins to drum against her mug out of habit, slow and thoughtless as warm tea settled cosily in her belly. 

 

  “So, you’re a student huh?”

 

  Momo blinks before remembering all the work she’d had sprawled over the counter when Sana came through the front door. 

 

  “Mm yeah, third year business major.” Something akin to surprise flits across Sana’s face - it’s something Momo will never get tired of when she tells someone her field of study. “You?”

 

  “Third year Law.”

 

  Momo’s eyes nearly pop out of their sockets. Sana’s shy laughter attests to how silly she must have looked - even by her own standards.

 

  “That’s… impressive. And hard.”

 

  “No more impressive than your course.”

 

  Momo waves her off. “Please. I know the hours you guys pull. There are people on my course who haven’t put in an extra hour of work the entire three years we’ve been there.” 

 

  “Clearly that doesn’t apply to you, if you do your work while also working a job.” 

 

  The way Sana is looking at her is starting to make her nervous. It’s… intense, to have someone looking at you so much in such an intimate situation; just two girls in a tiny back room, sitting close enough that their knees could touch and making small talk to fill the time. Or maybe this was something more, and that’s why Momo felt so taken aback when curious eyes peer at her over the rim of a cup. She clears her throat and smiles, focusing on the rain drops.

 

  “I have plans. I actually want to get somewhere with this degree, so I have to work hard.”

 

  “What do you want to do?” She’s soft, and inviting. An old soul, Chaeyoung would call her - and Momo’s always found comfort in the tried and tested.

 

  “I want to open my own dance studio someday. Go back to my first love and do it for the rest of my life, but I need to learn the basics before I can even think about funding something like that. So, here I am. Most of the way through a business degree just so maybe ten years in the future I’ll have what I want.” 

 

  “That’s… really cute, actually.” The way Sana’s looking at her makes Momo think she just told her the secret to the eighth wonder of the world, and Momo half considers going through all the trials and tribulations to try and figure it out if only to earn that wondrous expression again. 

 

  “Ah,” She tugs at her ear, looking down into her mostly full mug and wearing a shy smile, “it’s nothing special.” 

 

  She gets a disgruntled hum of disapproval in response, but the bite in it is clouded by tiredness. As though Sana  _ wants  _ to disagree and put up a fight, to say ‘yes it  _ is _ special’, but the exhaustion from being caught in the rain is starting to set in. 

 

  It’s a little reminiscent of the night they’d first met; Sana, fighting back the restraints of sleep with every stifled yawn, and every hidden attempt to subtly rub the sleep out of eyes that are getting more and more difficult to keep open with every passing moment, smiling that same, tired, droopy smile that made Momo’s stomach twist uncontrollably. She takes long, slow blinks, sleep pooling along the inside of tired eyes that came dangerously close to spilling over every time they shut. 

 

  The rain still hasn’t lightened up since they sat down. It’s constant and relentless and an overhanging reminder that there’s no way Momo can let Sana walk home, not when she can barely stay awake even now. 

 

  “What about you?” She says instead of what’s on her mind, taking a big gulp of the cooled down tea to soothe her nerves, “Why law?”

 

  Sana smiles then. Different to the sleepy, worn out smile from before and barely visible behind the rim of her mug. It reaches her eyes all the same, the girl humming bemusedly as her nails tap against the ceramic absently.

 

  “I like proving people wrong.” She laughs lightly at Momo’s response, eyes wide and eyebrows about five stories above her hairline. Momo’s not sure what answer she was expecting, but it certainly didn’t sound so smug and self assured in her head. 

 

  (It didn’t sound quite so low and attractive either, but the world was full of surprises like that.) 

 

  There’s more to her answer, Momo can tell by the eager glint in her eyes when she asked the question in the first place, but sleep triumphs need and whatever else Sana might have said gets swallowed by the loud yawn that takes over her whole face. She’s all lazy limbs and sluggish movements as a sleeve swallowed hand tries to preserve a little bit of modesty, but it’s half hearted and Momo sees every feature scrunch up tightly and sleep coated eyes all but disappear. 

 

  Momo bites the bullet.

 

  “So this probably sounds really weird but you look  _ really _ tired and you live all the way across town so uh… do you want to sleep at my place instead.”

 

  Sana blinks slowly, drowsily. Rubbing at her eyes with a small, teasing smile playing on her lips despite the exhaustion wearing her down.

 

  “I only live two streets away,” Momo continues nervously, rambling because Sana is just smiling and tiredly dragging her hands down her face and  _ God _ Momo was messing this up, “And I’m not a serial killer or anything which, I know, is  _ exactly _ what a serial killer would say, but I just… you just…”

 

  She shrugs, sheepishly, a little embarrassed and too busy looking at the floor to see the way Sana’s looking at her.

 

  “...You look really tired.”

 

  Her words taper off quietly, awkwardly, until the rain fills the silence between them. She’s glad for the almost empty mug in her hand because she always has to be doing  _ something  _ with them, and gripping onto the cool ceramic like a lifeline means she isn’t close to ripping her jeans out of nervousness for once. 

 

  “Shouldn't you be more worried about  _ me _ being a serial killer?” Momo looks up to see Sana looking back at her with a playful glint in her eyes, sitting forward with her chin in her palm, “Inviting strangers into your home?”

 

  “You can barely stay awake, let alone murder me in my sleep.” She laughs.

 

  Sana tuts in admonishment. “Maybe I'm just a really good actress.” 

 

  Another yawn splits apart her smug grin and Momo has to fight not to break into her own yawn. 

 

  “Yeah, a  _ really _ good actress.” She teases back, smiling wider at the half hearted swipe Sana takes at her knee. 

 

  Her fingers drum against her mug before she stands, plucking Sana’s mug out of fingers that were barely even holding it anymore to place them in the sink. Resists the urge to shove her awkward hands in the back pocket of her jeans and instead offers them to the tired girl, melting when Sana aims a grateful smile at her as she pulls her to her feet. It’s mostly Momo, maybe partly Sana that actually gets her out of the chair and gets them both moving to the front of the store, Momo opening the door for the other girl and grabbing her backpack as it closes behind them. 

 

  It takes her half a minute to pack her work that had been abandoned on the counter, nose wrinkling distastefully at the bitter reminder and zipping her bag shut with much more vigour than she should have. Sana waits patiently, watching her with thinly veiled interest and swaying gently back and forth on the ball of her feet. There’s a small weight pulling at her sleeve when she finishes, and it’s only when she feels small fingers curling in the fabric that she realises what it is.

 

  She pretends that the sudden strip of heat she can feel on her cheeks is from the tea.  _ Definitely _ from the lukewarm tea. 

 

  Sana stays there the entire time she scribbles out a hasty message for Jungeun to count the till when the girl opens in the morning, maybe just because she wants to, maybe because she’s two minutes away from curling up on the spot and sleeping there and then - Momo isn’t sure. The end of her poorly scrawled apology ends up even messier than she’d planned when the other girl slumps against her arm tiredly, humming to a tune Momo doesn’t recognise as she tags on an ‘I.O.U xox’ and pins the note to the register. Takes half a second to feel guilty but there’s more pressing matters on her mind, and against her arm, and leaning more heavily against her shoulder the longer she takes with soft sighs. 

 

  She leads them both to the front door, making sure Sana’s sheltered from the rain by the minuscule canopy that overhangs the entrance before closing it to, fishing the keys out of her pocket to lock it. Jiggles the handle three times just to make sure and turns to Sana with a relieved sigh. The other girl is hugging herself tightly, arms wrapped around herself firmly as she stares out at the unrelenting sheet of rain inches from her face. She only lives two streets away, but in that time they’ll both get completely soaked and Momo wants to avoid that as best she can. She should have listened to Nayeon, should have taken the umbrella when she mentioned.

 

  (She hates it when she’s right.)

 

  Sana doesn’t notice her taking off her jacket, jumping in surprise when the weight of Momo’s arm settles across her shoulder, covering them both in a makeshift umbrella and looks up at the grinning cashier with a raised eyebrow.

 

  “You ready?”

 

  Momo shuffles closer, pulling at Sana’s hand to guide her to wrap an arm around her waist. Fingers scrunch tightly at the hem of her shirt and a soft body presses into her side easily. She feels the lazy nod against her shoulder, and sucks in a sharp breath.

 

  “Alright!”

 

  The rain is heavier than she expected but she manages to hold her jacket in place above them, not minding that her one elbow is sticking out and there’s water already trickling down her sleeve and her shirt, but she is a woman on a mission and that mission is to get home as fast as possible. They can barely hear their already soaked shoes slapping against the asphalt as they run over the sheer force of the rain hitting the ground, but Momo can hear breathy laughter with every step. 

 

  It’s the absurdity of it all that pulls a string of laughter out of her chest, both of them running through puddles and shrieking when they splash through the bigger ones and the water gets into their shoes. They can hardly see an arms length in front of them but Momo knows the way home like the back of her hand, and Sana’s holding her tightly gasping out tiny giggles that make Momo’s chest feel like it’s several miles above the clouds where the rain can’t melt away her cotton candy heart. 

 

  There’s a dozen things that she should be thinking about right now; whether or not Nayeon was ever going to introduce her to her maybe girlfriend, and whether she was going to get a decent grade for this project with her lazy group-mates and if she could convince her professor to switch, and maybe she forgot to hang her laundry up to dry before she left for her shift and Jungeun was  _ definitely _ going to use her I.O.U at the worst time possible, and she forgot to grab those brownies Nayeon wanted, but none of that matters just at the moment. It’s all pushed back and shoved aside by the rain and the way back home, and maybe something a little more. 

 

  Just another night.

 

  (But a whole lot better.)


End file.
